Life in the city

Red eared sliders

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Sad ending

I tried twice to have red eared sliders as a pet. They are cute and some time ago you could buy them easily in Beijing. Now that many small shops were forced to close. more difficult. Friends had left me with a fish tank and accessories. So I tried.
I did some research, I tried to follow the instructions.

At the beginning the tiny one liked my shrimp and some salad. But gradually it stopped eating. I tried to have the right water, some light to warm up, but the poor little thing died (slowly).
A second one, same story. then I gave up. Later on, out of sympathy, the glass of the fish tank cracked by itself and the whole stuff for fishes went out of the house.

Why it did not work, no idea. Frustrating. Maybe the small turtles sold here are not healthy – it also happens with young puppies, bred under poor conditions. Many are frail and get sick easily.

Red eared sliders

There is a lot about it on the Internet. This site explains well:
https://aminoapps.com/c/pets/page/item/red-eared-sliders/N4uW_IRXnovrJ8vELVaZ7YVvPP6NP

See here what it says, in part.
Red eared sliders are given this name because of the red streaks on the sides of their face that cover the ears. They’re common turtles and come from North America. They are semi-aquatic and require a basking area. They should have a 20 gallon tank when they are young. The golden rule is “Every inch of shell length, provide 10 gallons of water”. OK, that’s a lot of water! One gallon is about 3.78 liter…

Wild sliders can live up to 30 years. In my case less than 2 months…
An adult red eared slider can grow up to 15 to 30 cm.
Like all pets they have a number of health problems to look out for. It is important to research the health problems they might have. You tell me!
They are messy eaters (yes!) and should be placed in a separate area to eat (they need a dining room?) but it you want to feed your slider in its tank then go ahead, just make sure to fish out the uneaten food or it’ll be a long clean up when finally cleaning their tank.
They like to eat mealworms, crickets, shrimp, pellets, floating stick, cranberries and greens. You can also give them live fish or crickets for them to eat or chase and add aquatic plants to their habitat. Just make sure to get fish and plants that appeal to their diet. I showed them a menu but they ignored it.

Damn!

Beijing birds

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

My little friends

Referring to Beijing birds I am not thinking of all the pretty mini-skirts invading my Gongti Strip, now facing a slow destruction.

I have two balconies I love, where I grow plants and even some vegetables. But the birds visiting me daily are my fluffy friends. They come to drink, eat, play, fight, make love. I am not an expert but I tried to identify some of my guests. Especially in winter they love it and wait for me to feed them. At times there are some 25 of them fighting for the food.

Eurasian tree sparrows and spotted doves are the regulars. Eurasian magpie (pica pica) are afraid to visit but there are many flying around in my compound. I think crows also come here.
To spot the swallows and the small bats, one need to go out in the late evening when they zoom around to catch insects.

Contrary to the birds in Belgium and Phuket, here they are pretty scared of humans and fly away at any sign of us. In Phuket I have to be careful they don’t jump on my breakfast plate.

Of course sometimes we are suspicious of all those “birds”. Are they simply spying on us?

Taking care of the Beijing birds

Over the years I changed the way they can eat. I installed some wire in one pot so the doves and sparrows don’t fight to much – the doves can’t land because of the wire.
I mostly give them corn grain, we can buy it very cheap in the local market. They love it.

Sometimes I get some unexpected visitors, such as the Pallas’s Leaf Warbler (Phylloscopus proregulus), see the pic. Sometimes a bird hits the window; some I help recover, some don’t make it. Once I had to free a sparrow who got entangled in the balcony fence.

I am sure I have seen other “exotic” ones, as I can see what is flying around here: https://birdingbeijing.com/birders-guide-to-beijing/.
There is indeed an active group of bird watchers in Beijing.

Extra birds

After posting the above, found some more pics.
See how they wait and flood my balcony…

Our compound has many cats, being fed daily by some ladies. See this one, climbed way high and was watching the crows. Or the crows watching the cat…

Beijing Rotary in Morel

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Dinner instead of lunch

This time, Beijing Rotary in Morel Restaurant as our club is doing some dinner evenings instead of the usual lunches in Kempinski.
We had a nice crowd, many nationalities with some guests who were interested to listen to our speaker of the evening, Michael.

Michael, our speaker

Michael is a game addict and enthusiast programmer since age 11-12.

After a career in finance & investment industry, in 2003  back to China to join his beloved game industry as Chief Operating Officer of Netease (the second biggest Chinese game company); since then been making games, publishing games and investing into many game companies. Left Netease to start his own company, now being restructured.
Speaker Michael Tong gave us an overview of the video game industry with added spicy controversies and special surprising aspects for people not familiar with the industry, e.g. its size compared to movie and music industry, how people can acquire knowledge from games, and how it is affecting pop culture. For many of the “older” people, a new world – except if they have kids…

Morel’s Restaurant and Café

As always, Chef Renaat did not disappoint. We had a good deal for this great menu, most went for the menu. a very few chose from A La Carte.
Morel’s Dinner menu:

Starter: Fishers Wife Salad
Flemish Vegetable Soup
Main course

Medallion of Beef tenderloin with mushroom sauce
Or
Red Snapper Provençale style

Dessert: Pancakes with Ice cream & Fresh Fruit Salad
WHITE wine: Chile, Luis Felipe Edwards Chardonnay 2015
RED Wine: French, Château de France, Côtes de Bordeaux 2013
Local beer and soft drinks.

 

Old China Hands Lunch 4 September

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Back in numbers!

We had our Old China Hands Lunch 4 September with a very nice attendance: 30 plus one child! That is the best we had this year. Of course we miss the thirty something of our members still stuck abroad.

Our friend Kent brought a big tiramisu as a desert for all. It was wonderful. He also got the praise from Chef Renaat!

Next lunch

Planned for Friday 2 October, right in the middle of the October 1 Golden Week. It’s a gamble as always: no excuse you need to work. Bored at home, as many (like me) still avoid travel and the annoyance of being targeted as “dangerous foreign virus carriers”.
Anyway, Morel’s Restaurant will be open, so let’s go for it!

New Beijing Workers Stadium

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Confusion

Few people seem to be aware we will have a new Beijing Workers Stadium, expected to be delivered by December 2022, to be ready for the July 2023 Opening Ceremonies for the 2023 Asian Cup Games. Many were confused why the old stadium was being demolished starting on 5 August 2020.

See how the Stadium looked like and the razing that took a few days only. They used water cannons to reduce the dust.
Well, blame the usual lack of communication by the Beijing Government. Some even say the secrecy is due to the fact the area is “owned by the military”.
The new stadium will be at the same location but with improvements to meet the needs of world-class professional football field.
However it is a fact there is a total lack of clarity how the area will be transformed as it is the location of many restaurants, discos, KTV and other outlets.
Also unclear is what will happen with the Gongti Indoor Stadium: they just started building a big fence around it.
I first reported on it here.

As far as I know most if not all of the venues will be closed at some point. That would also include Legend Beer, among others. It is said “The Workers Stadium will also become an open urban public space for mass sports and cultural activities and a new vitality center of the city.”

A long history and end of life

I have so many stories about that stadium. It was also my training ground to prepare for my marathons, having the complete stadium with its running track only for myself.

The main structure of the Workers Stadium had reached its service life.
It was designed by the Beijing Institute of Architectural Design and Research and was completed and put into use in 1959. It was the largest comprehensive stadium in the eastern part of Beijing. It had a standard football field, a 400-meter rubber track among others. The main building was 64,000 sqm. it was the venue for the first National Games and other large-scale sports events.

According to the Beijing Municipal Commission of Planning and Natural Resources, the main building of the Stadium was a concrete structure with a design life of 50 years. Since the 1990s, three structural reinforcements and one facility renovation have been carried out. Among them, in order to host the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the Workers’ Stadium has undergone comprehensive structural reinforcement in accordance with the 7-degree seismic fortification standard (the Beijing area is an 8-degree seismic fortification area) – the service life is 12 years. At present, the main structure of the Beijing Workers Stadium had reached the end of its service life, and there are potential safety hazards and obsolete facilities and equipment.

By 2018, the National Construction Engineering Quality Supervision and Inspection Center conducted a house inspection and appraisal of the construction. The conclusion was the overall structural safety and seismic resistance of the building seriously did not meet the relevant national standards. It also did not meet the requirements of the Asian Cup and other major international professional football matches. Therefore, it was urgent to upgrade.

The new stadium

After the transformation of the new Beijing Workers Stadium, the elliptical shape of the main building will remain basically unchanged, and it will meet the needs of the internal circular passage while maintaining the proportion of the facade.
At the same time, the reconstruction will keep the original characteristic elements of the construction body basically unchanged, and protect and restore the important characteristic elements, such as flagpoles, gate posts, sculptures, and architectural decoration components.

See a few pictures showing the future stadium and the surrounding area. While some may be “artist rendering” most of the existing structures in the area seem to be gone except for the two main buildings of former “Gongti Yibai”.

You can also see the large new underground facilities with the connection to the new subway lines (should be Line 3 and Line 17, all currently under construction).
See also a view on the new facility being built by CSCEC on the East side of the Stadium: “China Philharmonic Orchestra Concert Hall and Rehearsal Facilities”.
Nobody talks about this…
And a lot is going on also in the South East corner of the Gongti area. No idea what is coming there.

Sources, among other:
http://www.bjnews.com.cn/news/2020/08/20/760571.html
https://xw.qq.com/cmsid/20200807A0GC8Z00?ADTAG=amp

I keep you posted!